Clarabelle: The Montgomery Advertiser’s “Felonious Feline” Featured In Alabama Heritage Magazine

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Even Grover Cleveland Hall, the Pulitzer Prize-winning editor of the Montgomery Advertiser from 1926-1941, didn’t know the scroungy piebald cat that appeared at the Advertiser’s offices in January 1938 would soon become the most talked about female in Montgomery.

Named Clarabelle, this “felonious feline” captivated the newspaper staff and the public as well. From the moment she sashayed onto the Advertiser’s editorial page she “ran away with the show,” as Hall himself admitted.

In the spring issue of Alabama Heritage magazine Aileen Kilgore Henderson traces the history of Clarabelle at the Montgomery Advertiser, from Clarabelle’s arrival in the offices to her death in 1940. Along the way, Henderson details Clarabelle’s political influence through Hall’s use of her voice on the editorial page, as well as her widespread fame reaching Ohio and New York. Clarabelle was not without detractors and enemies, as she experienced abuse and debates as to whether she even existed. But through it all, Clarabelle remained aloof from controversy, tough and truthful — a fit epitaph for a newspaper cat.

Henderson has previously contributed to Alabama Heritage with “Listen for the Coaling Train,” a remembrance of her time as a member of the Women’s Army Corps during World War II. Henderson has written three juvenile novels, all published by Milkweed Editions of Minneapolis, and a World War II diary, “Stateside Soldier,” published by the University of South Carolina Press in March. She sits on the board of directors of the Alabama Writers’ Forum, is a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, and serves as a proofreader for Alabama Heritage magazine.

Alabama Heritage is a nonprofit quarterly magazine published by The University of Alabama and the University of Alabama at Birmingham. To order the magazine, write Alabama Heritage, Box 870342, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0342, or call 205/348-7467.

Contact

Sara Martin, Alabama Heritage, 205/348-7467